Poll: Do you have "buyer's remorse" regarding adult life?
Yes. Adult life has turned out to be a great disappointment. I was sold a bill of goods.
Life is good. I have no nostalgia regarding younger more carefree days.
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Do you have "buyer's remorse" about adult life?
#1
For some generations, adulthood is the Holy Grail. For such cohorts, it is a time of self sufficiency, rich rewards for hard work, and seemingly limitless opportunities. For others, it is an unending nightmare of shattered dreams, limits to growth, and a nasty ride down the razor blade of life culminating in death and decay. Identify your cohort and tell me your view.

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#2
(06-09-2016, 04:40 PM)X_4AD_84 Wrote: For some generations, adulthood is the Holy Grail. For such cohorts, it is a time of self sufficiency, rich rewards for hard work, and seemingly limitless opportunities. For others, it is an unending nightmare of shattered dreams, limits to growth, and a nasty ride down the razor blade of life culminating in death and decay. Identify your cohort and tell me your view.

I'm a late-wave Boomer, and I graduated from college (which was then relatively cheap), only to find that the Vietnam-era draft-dodgers had beaten me to all the desirable opportunities. What was left? The crap jobs of the 1970s -- fast food, retail sales, and work in sweat-shop factories. I could never get on track. Once one takes those crappy jobs one's career potential is gone. Some times I wish I had never been born. The only good thing to say about the last forty years is that we have had some really-cheap entertainment. Mass low culture has become the opiate of the masses in the sense that Karl Marx saw religion as the opiate of the masses.

At the least the oppressed prole toiling in a sweatshop had no obligation to express how happy he was to hold the job that he had. Today the prole often is obliged to suffer with a smile in jobs that show how degraded his life is. In that respect workers in the service jobs have it far worse, at least existentially, than the millhands of early capitalism. But that said, people addled on stupefying bilge might see nothing wrong.

I could almost think of the plot of a dystopian novel in which a repressive and exploitative regime offers entertainment but little else as a reward for pliancy. If one is a double-high-ninety in verbal and mathematical aptitude, then that is the worst possible world. Most nasty systems co-opt people like me. Unfortunately that plot looks so much like reality that it would be a bore.

The rules changed for young workers around 1978. Before then college graduates could usually expect good pay in interesting work unless they went to some diploma mill. After that they were qualified to do the sorts of work that high-school graduates got. What has changed? A college education has become not only a way to qualify for jobs that used to require a high-school education, but also a means of beginning adulthood deeply in debt.
The ideal subject of totalitarian rule is not the convinced Nazi or the dedicated Communist  but instead the people for whom the distinction between fact and fiction, true and false, no longer exists -- Hannah Arendt.


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#3
I selected the first option. I'm trying to keep my chin up, though. And I think that to some extent, my problems are my own fault.

(1971, core Generation X)
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#4
The rules changed, and I lacked suitable advice and direction.

I might have been wiser to take a chance on starting a business -- but what business? -- than trusting bureaucratic organizations in which glass ceilings were forming. I might have been wiser to have sought a skilled trade instead of a college degree, or taking a chance in one of the go-go high-tech firms in the San Francisco Bay Area. People who bought a little stock at Hewlett-Packard as a near start-up while employees therein often got spectacularly rich on share appreciation alone. But college seemed like such a good idea. It always had been. It was fun and stimulating.

The climate of American Big Business changed, and the MBA culture (the first duty of a leader is to himself!) took over.

With poor balance and hand speed, I would have never fared well in a machine-paced job of any kind. But those ended up going to Mexico and China. Academia? I found a bit late that K-12 education wasn't so poor a career choice as all the experts said that it was. Of course going for a grad degree would have had me competing for such few openings as the over-educated draft-dodgers of the Vietnam era left open.

...I now realize too late that whatever one does, true excellence in anything in which mediocrity is neither tolerated nor rewarded takes about 10,000 hours of preparation for someone with above-average raw talent. That is how it goes for actors, performers, athletes, writers, artists, professionals, and skilled tradespeople. Something that one can earn in a short time typically rewards one with mediocre or worse compensation. I needed a focus, and I was around people who had no clue that I needed such a focus to get anything out of life.

Be a good, loyal employee with potential? That used to be good enough/ It is no longer adequate. The rigid class structure has solidified in American bureaucracies.
The ideal subject of totalitarian rule is not the convinced Nazi or the dedicated Communist  but instead the people for whom the distinction between fact and fiction, true and false, no longer exists -- Hannah Arendt.


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#5
X_4AD_84 Wrote:For some generations, adulthood is the Holy Grail. For such cohorts, it is a time of self sufficiency, rich rewards for hard work, and seemingly limitless opportunities.
The above was true. Now it's just coasting on to retirement and not feeding the beast. Cool  No debts, no worries, no regrets.
Most of adulthood was being a *nix sysadmin until I got H1-B'd. Tongue  That pissed me off so like, I said, my goal is to turn on to good jams, tune in to self sufficiency as much as possible, and opt out of the system. Big Grin   ---

---- Cause, man... ya can't be a good buyer of con$mer shit of Corporate America if ya ain't got the dough.  It fucks the bottom line, their weakness and I know it.


Quote: For others, it is an unending nightmare of shattered dreams, limits to growth, and a nasty ride down the razor blade of life culminating in death and decay. Identify your cohort and tell me your view.
I think that goes for folks who for no act unto themselves find themselves as debt slaves.

So cue it.

I've Got To Rock To Stay Alive


Saxon Wrote:'Ive paid my dues, I've been around
I've had my share of ups and downs
I'll never stop, it's in my blood
I've got to rock, it feels so good
Can't stop me now, it's in my soul
I've got to play more rock 'n' roll
I can't live, I can't breathe
You got to give me what I need
Can't go on, can't survive
I got to rock to stay alive, stay alive
Play it loud, turn me on
Give it to me all night long
Loud and proud that's what I like
You've got to get the feeling right
Don't stop now, it's in my soul
I've got to rock, I can't say no
I can't live, I can't breathe
You got to give me what I need
Can't go on, can't survive
I got to rock to stay alive, stay alive
I can't live, I can't breathe
You got to give me what I need
Can't go on, can't survive
I got to rock to stay alive
Let me tell you what you need
You've got to set your spirit free
Just hear the power and feel the beat
Shout out loud and stamp your feet
Cut me loose but don't let go
I got to have more rock 'n' roll
I can't live, I can't breathe
You got to give me what I need
Can't go on, can't survive
I got to rock to stay alive, stay alive
I can't live, I can't breathe
You got to give me what I need
Can't go on, can't survive
I got to rock to stay alive, stay alive
I can't live, I can't breathe
I've got to rock to stay alive

Beavisbutthead
---Value Added Cool
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#6
I can't vote either way, because when I was young I was not deceived by the supposed promised advantages of adult life. It seemed to me almost a living death. And today, I can't imagine becoming the kind of rigid, overweight, stolid person that older people often are. If I could be young forever, I would. But I can't entirely avoid the problems of elderhood, I know. I might not get life from the same kind of rock that Ragnarok does, but I have the same sentiment.
"I close my eyes, and I can see a better day" -- Justin Bieber

Keep the spirit alive;
Eric M
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#7
What we often think of as prosperity in America is people selling out their dreams cheaply. By doing so people make possible the extreme wealth, power, indulgence, and ostentation of people as exploitative as feudal lords.

Employer, Family, God, and Home... such is what my parents impressed upon me as the objectives of life. In that, there is no room for "I" or "Individuality". Maybe not "Imagination". "Independence", or "Innovation", either.
The ideal subject of totalitarian rule is not the convinced Nazi or the dedicated Communist  but instead the people for whom the distinction between fact and fiction, true and false, no longer exists -- Hannah Arendt.


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#8
I voted for the second. For me, being a child sucked. No control, no understanding of why people acted the way they were.
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#9
Hmm…

I had a lousy young childhood.  I was a nerd before nerds started projecting their own version of cool.  I got my act more or less together my junior year in high school, and pretty much enjoyed social life from there on out, finding various like minded groups to have fun with without too much difficulty.

I did a co-op plan through college, going to school for 3 months then alternating with 3 months of work.  The co-op jobs paid well in those days.  My senior year in college I looked at my tuition bills, looked at my bank account, then went out and bought a brand new car and an organ.  These days, instead of a well paying high tech job, a kid would be trying to get an internship, doing unpaid work for the sort of experience I got paid for?  Not right.  The millenials in the family came out of school with quite a debt burden, while the boomer generation came out fairly clean.

I came out of college into stagflation and the national malaise era.  The ride wasn’t always smooth, but I managed to stay with one high tech military industrial complex job for my entire career.  For a while wage- price controls made it fashionable for professionals to jump from company to company.  Companies weren’t allowed to give competitive wages to keep professionals, so those who wanted top dollar would change jobs every several years.  In the Route 128 high tech environment at least, the professionals had the advantage in job seeking.  I eventually retired reasonably comfortably, though at the time it felt more like being the victim of downsizing rather than retirement.  While my GI father could count on a job for life from Ma Bell after getting a job shortly after World War II, by the end of my career well paid older professionals were often and systematically let go if they could find youngsters who could do the job almost as well for much less money.  I guess you could say I wasn’t totally immune to Reagan’s unravelling era reinvention of the economy to favor the corporations over the workers.

Music wise, the Beatles were popping out new albums on a regular basis in my youth, while Carol King’s Tapestry was the sound track of my senior year in high school.  I know we boomers should not be so very smug about our generation’s music, but no buyer’s remorse there.

In my youth, NASA was running projects Mercury, Gemini and Apollo.  In young adulthood, Mohammad Ali and Secretariat were doing their thing.  For a while on any given night on the half hour network TV news coverage, there was 25 minutes of Watergate coverage.  They finally did get the (expletive deleted.)  I got a favorable number when they did my birth year’s draft lottery.    Over my life time, the local pro sports teams have featured Bill Russell, Bobby Orr, Larry Bird and Tom Brady, all with fine supporting casts.  The Red Sox even managed to break their 86 year drought.  Not bad.

All in all, I’d say I landed in a pretty good time and place.
That this nation, under God, shall have a new birth of freedom, and that government of the people, by the people, for the people shall not perish from the earth.
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#10
(06-11-2016, 05:00 PM)Bob Butler 54 Wrote: Hmm…

I had a lousy young childhood.  I was a nerd before nerds started projecting their own version of cool.  I got my act more or less together my junior year in high school, and pretty much enjoyed social life from there on out, finding various like minded groups to have fun with without too much difficulty.


Many of us were misfits. Some of us did badly at what was 'popular' at the time, like athleticism, and chose other directions. Some of us grew up in god-awful places and knew it. Where I live it is best to think like a peasant -- be sentimental and materialistic, yet undemanding.

Quote:I did a co-op plan through college, going to school for 3 months then alternating with 3 months of work.  The co-op jobs paid well in those days.  My senior year in college I looked at my tuition bills, looked at my bank account, then went out and bought a brand new car and an organ.  These days, instead of a well paying high tech job, a kid would be trying to get an internship, doing unpaid work for the sort of experience I got paid for?  Not right.  The millenials in the family came out of school with quite a debt burden, while the boomer generation came out fairly clean.

And who can do the internships? The young adults who do not have debts to pay off and can live with their parents until 27 or so. No internship means that if one gets a job it will be something paying at or near the minimum wage with no real escape. We may not becoming as severe a class society as the slave-era South or even Imperial Russia -- but we are headed there. If one is heavily in debt one must take whatever jobs are available, and if one job doesn't meet debt service and raw sustenance, then one needs a second.

Quote:I came out of college into stagflation and the national malaise era.  The ride wasn’t always smooth, but I managed to stay with one high tech military industrial complex job for my entire career.  For a while wage- price controls made it fashionable for professionals to jump from company to company.  Companies weren’t allowed to give competitive wages to keep professionals, so those who wanted top dollar would change jobs every several years.  In the Route 128 high tech environment at least, the professionals had the advantage in job seeking.  I eventually retired reasonably comfortably, though at the time it felt more like being the victim of downsizing rather than retirement.

That could be the difference between being early-wave Boom and late-wave Boom -- the level of opportunity.

Quote:  While my GI father could count on a job for life from Ma Bell after getting a job shortly after World War II, by the end of my career well paid older professionals were often and systematically let go if they could find youngsters who could do the job almost as well for much less money.  I guess you could say I wasn’t totally immune to Reagan’s unravelling era reinvention of the economy to favor the corporations over the workers.

Unless one was already in the elite, the Reagan economy was a raw deal. I have yet to see what good came from it. Technology? That had more to do with engineering than with politics. Cheap fast food? A consequence of an abundant supply of cheap, competent labor that could be overworked and underpaid with impunity.

Quote:Music wise, the Beatles were popping out new albums on a regular basis in my youth, while Carol King’s Tapestry was the sound track of my senior year in high school.  I know we boomers should not be so very smug about our generation’s music, but no buyer’s remorse there.

Late-wave Boomers got disco... and many of us turned away from the commercial pap made available to us all.

Quote:In my youth, NASA was running projects Mercury, Gemini and Apollo.  In young adulthood, Mohammad Ali and Secretariat were doing their thing.  For a while on any given night on the half hour network TV news coverage, there was 25 minutes of Watergate coverage.  They finally did get the (expletive deleted.)  I got a favorable number when they did my birth year’s draft lottery.    Over my life time, the local pro sports teams have featured Bill Russell, Bobby Orr, Larry Bird and Tom Brady, all with fine supporting casts.  The Red Sox even managed to break their 86 year drought.  Not bad.

All in all, I’d say I landed in a pretty good time and place.

The sports stars are as good as ever. So what?
The ideal subject of totalitarian rule is not the convinced Nazi or the dedicated Communist  but instead the people for whom the distinction between fact and fiction, true and false, no longer exists -- Hannah Arendt.


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#11
Bob Butler 54 Wrote:Hmm…

I had a lousy young childhood.  I was a nerd before nerds started projecting their own version of cool.  I got my act more or less together my junior year in high school, and pretty much enjoyed social life from there on out, finding various like minded groups to have fun with without too much difficulty.

School was a so so thing as far as grade school 1969 was when all of the weirdness came slamming down. Class was held in a nearby park and just using the playground equipment was pretty common. Actual learning was optional. I'd just crack open science books and mess with those.  Jr. high was Fight Club chaos. Those 3 years were the worst. High school as a drugged out scene and pretty pleasant.


Quote:I did a co-op plan through college, going to school for 3 months then alternating with 3 months of work.  The co-op jobs paid well in those days.

I did stints of summer and winter break paid internships where my dad work. He worked at a large oil company. The first year made some sort of spectrometer reference stuff. It had paraffin base mixed with standardized oil by element. The guy who invented the stuff showed me how to measure the stuff out so the product would be real accurate. I then got orders and shipped it all over the place. If I got the orders all done, I could just hand out and read books.

Next year, I debugged Fortran programs. The year after that was messing with DOS printer drivers and writing Lotus 123 macros.

Quote: My senior year in college I looked at my tuition bills, looked at my bank account, then went out and bought a brand new car and an organ.

Yeah, $4.00/hr tuition is light on the budget. My parents paid the room and board stuff. That was about $1000/semester.
I used the paper route money , high school job money, and intern money to make the down payment on my first house in post real estate crash Houston.  I picked up recent construction 3 bedroom 2 bath foreclosure for $40,000.

Quote:  These days, instead of a well paying high tech job, a kid would be trying to get an internship, doing unpaid work for the sort of experience I got paid for?  Not right.

One of my Millie nephews, the first one done with college has a nice $20,000 debt chain and live in my sister's basement.
He sort of messed up and majored in history and now works at Macy's. I wonder why colleges offer such go nowhere degrees?
  The millenials in the family came out of school with quite a debt burden, while the boomer generation came out fairly clean.

Quote:I came out of college into stagflation and the national malaise era.  The ride wasn’t always smooth, but I managed to stay with one high tech military industrial complex job for my entire career.  For a while wage- price controls made it fashionable for professionals to jump from company to company.  Companies weren’t allowed to give competitive wages to keep professionals, so those who wanted top dollar would change jobs every several years.  In the Route 128 high tech environment at least, the professionals had the advantage in job seeking.

The mid to late 1980's seems to be a sweetspot then. I worked for a major oil service company converting code from Fortran to C and at the end of career did Unix sysadmin work. Coding started leaving the US, but we still needed sysadmins. Then the H1-B's went and took that away.

Quote:  I eventually retired reasonably comfortably, though at the time it felt more like being the victim of downsizing rather than retirement.

I call that involuntary retirement. I got that one. I work at minimum wage job now and am just holding for SS to kick in. I just have to research how long I think I'll live to sort which option to take.

Quote: While my GI father could count on a job for life from Ma Bell after getting a job shortly after World War II, by the end of my career well paid older professionals were often and systematically let go if they could find youngsters who could do the job almost as well for much less money.  I guess you could say I wasn’t totally immune to Reagan’s unravelling era reinvention of the economy to favor the corporations over the workers.

Yeah, globalization sux. The end will be interesting. Company A depends on middle class buyers, however companies B,C... do what company A does so in the end, whenever that will be, no customers since we'll be frequenting 2nd hand stores. Even Wally World can't compete their own stuff to be had at second hand stores. That will be the end result.  I do think it's gonna hurt a lot of multinats since they'll be bereft of customers.  Blowback's a bitch.

Quote:Music wise, the Beatles were popping out new albums on a regular basis in my youth, while Carol King’s Tapestry was the sound track of my senior year in high school.  I know we boomers should not be so very smug about our generation’s music, but no buyer’s remorse there.

I have no buyer's remorse anywhere. Everything from Iron Butterfly to the new stuff now, it's all good. The early 1970's stuff was used to get past the Disco Drought. 

Quote:In my youth, NASA was running projects Mercury, Gemini and Apollo.  In young adulthood, Mohammad Ali and Secretariat were doing their thing.  For a while on any given night on the half hour network TV news coverage, there was 25 minutes of Watergate coverage.  They finally did get the (expletive deleted.)  I got a favorable number when they did my birth year’s draft lottery.    Over my life time, the local pro sports teams have featured Bill Russell, Bobby Orr, Larry Bird and Tom Brady, all with fine supporting casts.  The Red Sox even managed to break their 86 year drought.  Not bad.

1. Rags does NOT do sports!
2. Headlines remembered: Cayahouga river fire, moon landing, Earth Day, Watergate, end of Nam, Ken State <- weird,
Bi-Centennial,  Reagan 1980, Iran Hostage Crisis.

Quote:All in all, I’d say I landed in a pretty good time and place.

Yeah, but there ain't no poll option for that Bob. Big Grin
---Value Added Cool
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#12
At one time, any liberal arts degree was useful because it established that one could think coherently and communicate effectively. One had been exposed to the Great Questions of Existence. As such one could be a leader. One could adapt to many things.

Today one needs think only in narrow categories on behalf of organizations that prefer having interchangeable parts (people as if machines -- how dehumanizing!), that people think only of reward and punishment, that people live in fear of the Master Class, and that they do not challenge the status quo. Blind obedience, recognize of economic elites as people beyond judgment or criticism, and ideally support of reactionary politics well serve a grossly-inequitable social order. So one had to do something nasty to people? Dissolve your conscience with booze.

...Even if colleges all became technical and vocational schools, there would be far too many graduates for the engineering and software-design people, lab technicians, and nurses.

We need to rediscover the subtle delights of being truly human even at the cost of economic efficiency and rationality. Efficiency and rationality are not enough; a plantation of the Old South, a Gulag, or a fascist labor camp could be extremely efficient and rational while denying the qualities that make people human.

...The late science-fiction writer Robert Heinlein castigated the old Soviet Union as the land of the drunk. For the common man there was toil and there was drink, and nothing else. I wonder if America is headed that way.

... Speaking of something Soviet, I have a joke. George W. Bush got struck by a lightning bold on a hot, clear Texas day, and found himself in the Hereafter. But instead of meeting such illustrious predecessors as Washington, Lincoln, and FDR, or even such mediocrities as Fillmore, Harding, or Coolidge he found himself with Leonid Brezhnev. Unsettling as that encounter they got through a discussion of their shared mess of Afghanistan, and finally discussed the relative merits of their respective economies.

Brezhnev said, "You know the old saying... the workers pretend to work and we pretend to pay them".

Dubya responded, "We give workers fear and pay them with debt!"
The ideal subject of totalitarian rule is not the convinced Nazi or the dedicated Communist  but instead the people for whom the distinction between fact and fiction, true and false, no longer exists -- Hannah Arendt.


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#13
(06-12-2016, 01:16 AM)taramarie Wrote:
(06-11-2016, 11:59 PM)pbrower2a Wrote: At one time, any liberal arts degree was useful because it established that one could think coherently and communicate effectively. One had been exposed to the Great Questions of Existence. As such one could be a leader. One could adapt to many things.

Today one needs think only in narrow categories on behalf of organizations that prefer having interchangeable parts (people as if machines -- how dehumanizing!), that people think only of reward and punishment, that people live in fear of the Master Class, and that they do not challenge the status quo. Blind obedience, recognize of economic elites as people beyond judgment or criticism, and ideally support of reactionary politics well serve a grossly-inequitable social order. So one had to do something nasty to people? Dissolve your conscience with booze.

...Even if colleges all became technical  and vocational schools, there would be far too many graduates for the engineering and software-design people, lab technicians, and nurses.  

We need to rediscover the subtle delights of being truly human even at the cost of economic efficiency and rationality. Efficiency and rationality are not enough; a plantation of the Old South, a Gulag, or a fascist labor camp could be extremely efficient and rational while denying the qualities that make people human.

...The late science-fiction writer Robert Heinlein castigated the old Soviet Union as the land of the drunk. For the common man there was toil and there was drink, and nothing else. I wonder if America is headed that way.    

... Speaking of something Soviet, I have a joke. George W. Bush got struck by a lightning bold on a hot, clear Texas day, and found himself in the Hereafter. But instead of meeting such illustrious predecessors as Washington, Lincoln, and FDR, or even such mediocrities as Fillmore, Harding, or Coolidge he found himself with Leonid Brezhnev.  Unsettling as that encounter they got through a discussion of their shared mess of Afghanistan, and finally discussed the relative merits of their respective economies.

Brezhnev said, "You know the old saying... the workers pretend to work and we pretend to pay them".

Dubya responded, "We give workers fear and pay them with debt!"
Agree but NOT to the point where it sacrifices economic efficiency and rationality. That is illogical. You want another crash go right ahead.

Short-term efficiency at the cost of human happiness, let alone the survival and health (mental as well as physical) of those who actually do the work, is suspect.

Our productive capacities are great enough that we do not need poverty -- and we do not need to drive people to physical exhaustion just to get productivity.  We are at the stage at which we cannot get more prosperity from more production of stuff. We do not need more junk for the landfill or even more clutter.

Sustainable happiness is the measure of a wholesome life.
The ideal subject of totalitarian rule is not the convinced Nazi or the dedicated Communist  but instead the people for whom the distinction between fact and fiction, true and false, no longer exists -- Hannah Arendt.


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#14
The various accounts are interesting.  My own story was simple.  Grade school sucked.  High school was better.  College was better still.  Graduate school even better than that, so good I thought it would suck when I got out in the "real world" because "they" would demand "results" as Dr. Venkman says in Ghostbusters.  But it turned out to be better than school.  All my like stuff just gets better and better.  Eventually old age will set in and make me a senile old drooling geezer like my grandfather ended , but my wife thinks I am going to dodge that bullet too.  She is WAY smarter than I, so I pay a lot of attention to what she thinks (as well as because she is my wife and I want to live Wink ).

So things have been pretty good.
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#15
(06-12-2016, 12:43 PM)taramarie Wrote:
(06-12-2016, 12:02 PM)pbrower2a Wrote:
(06-12-2016, 01:16 AM)taramarie Wrote: [quote pid='2702' dateline='1465707586']
Agree but NOT to the point where it sacrifices economic efficiency and rationality. That is illogical. You want another crash go right ahead.

Short-term efficiency at the cost of human happiness, let alone the survival and health (mental as well as physical) of those who actually do the work, is suspect.

Our productive capacities are great enough that we do not need poverty -- and we do not need to drive people to physical exhaustion just to get productivity.  We are at the stage at which we cannot get more prosperity from more production of stuff. We do not need more junk for the landfill or even more clutter.

Sustainable happiness is the measure of a wholesome life.

Obviously you have never been in financial strife.
[/quote]

I am in great fear of losing everything. You do not understand the economics of the nursing home business in America.

If we get good economic measures in return for gross inequity and a climate of fear, then something is wrong -- most likely with the economic elite. The MBA culture that formed around 1980 was a rejection of humanistic values that make life tolerable for non-elites. People who believe that no human suffering is in excess so long as the Right People get what they want (basically everything not necessary for animal-like survival for everyone else, as in fascist and feudal orders).

We make enough stuff. We do badly at creating happiness because the ideology of American elites well suited to the sweat-shop level of economic development.
The ideal subject of totalitarian rule is not the convinced Nazi or the dedicated Communist  but instead the people for whom the distinction between fact and fiction, true and false, no longer exists -- Hannah Arendt.


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#16
(06-13-2016, 01:56 AM)taramarie Wrote:
(06-12-2016, 11:58 PM)pbrower2a Wrote: I am in great fear of losing everything. You do not understand the economics of the nursing home business in America.  

If we get good economic measures in return for gross inequity and a climate of fear, then something is wrong -- most likely with the economic elite. The MBA culture that formed around 1980 was a rejection of humanistic values that make life tolerable for non-elites. People who believe that no human suffering is in excess so long as the Right People get what they want (basically everything not necessary for animal-like survival for everyone else, as in fascist and feudal orders).

We make enough stuff. We do badly at creating happiness because the ideology of American elites well suited to the sweat-shop level of economic development.

You guys make enough "stuff" but people do not have the money to buy necessities and many are in debt. I believe that is what many are focusing on as the most important thing of all. Survival in hardship.


The economic elites have found how to control people so that they believe that nothing matters except that the elites get whatever they want -- which is everything. Around 1980 we largely Americans sold out to the concept that we are are nothing more than our basest drives. We allowed ourselves to be atomized in return for some vague promises of economic gain. Everything is about lucre.

We enter a Crisis Era because of the bad practices that have developed since the last Crisis, vices that have become nearly sacred. Yet those vices degrade us. Most arise from the 3T -- bad business practices and bad mass culture. One big contributor to our misfortune is the debasement of education, mostly from the Awakening-era "Multiversity". The idea that the college student wants to go as quickly into specialized training or to experience a watered-down grad school instead of developing some wisdom from millennia of experience best taught as the liberal arts has ensured that people, however technically proficient they may be, lack the wisdom even to recognize the virtue of reciprocal kindness. Life becomes little more than personal manipulation.

"Ship it", "sell it", "cut the deal". Of course it is all pragmatic. But what if "it" all depends upon the degradation of human existence?
The ideal subject of totalitarian rule is not the convinced Nazi or the dedicated Communist  but instead the people for whom the distinction between fact and fiction, true and false, no longer exists -- Hannah Arendt.


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#17
(06-13-2016, 05:24 AM)pbrower2a Wrote:
(06-13-2016, 01:56 AM)taramarie Wrote:
(06-12-2016, 11:58 PM)pbrower2a Wrote: I am in great fear of losing everything. You do not understand the economics of the nursing home business in America.  

If we get good economic measures in return for gross inequity and a climate of fear, then something is wrong -- most likely with the economic elite. The MBA culture that formed around 1980 was a rejection of humanistic values that make life tolerable for non-elites. People who believe that no human suffering is in excess so long as the Right People get what they want (basically everything not necessary for animal-like survival for everyone else, as in fascist and feudal orders).

We make enough stuff. We do badly at creating happiness because the ideology of American elites well suited to the sweat-shop level of economic development.

You guys make enough "stuff" but people do not have the money to buy necessities and many are in debt. I believe that is what many are focusing on as the most important thing of all. Survival in hardship.


The economic elites have found how to control people so that they believe that nothing matters except that the elites get whatever they want -- which is everything. Around 1980 we largely Americans sold out to the concept that we are are nothing more than our basest drives. We allowed ourselves to be atomized in return for some vague promises of economic gain. Everything is about lucre.

We enter a Crisis Era because of the bad practices that have developed since the last Crisis, vices that have become nearly sacred. Yet those vices degrade us. Most arise from the 3T -- bad business practices and bad mass culture. One big contributor to our misfortune is the debasement of education, mostly from the Awakening-era "Multiversity". The idea that the college student wants to go as quickly into specialized training or to experience a watered-down grad school instead of developing some wisdom from millennia of experience best taught as the liberal arts has ensured that people, however technically proficient they may be, lack the wisdom even to recognize the virtue of reciprocal kindness. Life becomes little more than personal manipulation.

"Ship it", "sell it", "cut the deal". Of course it is all pragmatic. But what if "it" all depends upon the degradation of human existence?

That is all correct. We focus on economic gain, justified by and geared toward gain for the elite. We end up with neither real life, wisdom and culture OR economic gain. We forget our millennia of experience, which includes the teaching of the one we once revered as our spiritual leader: seek first the Kingdom of God, and its righteousness, and all else will be added.
"I close my eyes, and I can see a better day" -- Justin Bieber

Keep the spirit alive;
Eric M
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#18
(06-13-2016, 11:46 AM)Eric the Green Wrote:
(06-13-2016, 05:24 AM)pbrower2a Wrote:
(06-13-2016, 01:56 AM)taramarie Wrote:
(06-12-2016, 11:58 PM)pbrower2a Wrote: I am in great fear of losing everything. You do not understand the economics of the nursing home business in America.  

If we get good economic measures in return for gross inequity and a climate of fear, then something is wrong -- most likely with the economic elite. The MBA culture that formed around 1980 was a rejection of humanistic values that make life tolerable for non-elites. People who believe that no human suffering is in excess so long as the Right People get what they want (basically everything not necessary for animal-like survival for everyone else, as in fascist and feudal orders).

We make enough stuff. We do badly at creating happiness because the ideology of American elites well suited to the sweat-shop level of economic development.

You guys make enough "stuff" but people do not have the money to buy necessities and many are in debt. I believe that is what many are focusing on as the most important thing of all. Survival in hardship.


The economic elites have found how to control people so that they believe that nothing matters except that the elites get whatever they want -- which is everything. Around 1980 we largely Americans sold out to the concept that we are are nothing more than our basest drives. We allowed ourselves to be atomized in return for some vague promises of economic gain. Everything is about lucre.

We enter a Crisis Era because of the bad practices that have developed since the last Crisis, vices that have become nearly sacred. Yet those vices degrade us. Most arise from the 3T -- bad business practices and bad mass culture. One big contributor to our misfortune is the debasement of education, mostly from the Awakening-era "Multiversity". The idea that the college student wants to go as quickly into specialized training or to experience a watered-down grad school instead of developing some wisdom from millennia of experience best taught as the liberal arts has ensured that people, however technically proficient they may be, lack the wisdom even to recognize the virtue of reciprocal kindness. Life becomes little more than personal manipulation.

"Ship it", "sell it", "cut the deal". Of course it is all pragmatic. But what if "it" all depends upon the degradation of human existence?

That is all correct. We focus on economic gain, justified by and geared toward gain for the elite. We end up with neither real life, wisdom and culture OR economic gain. We forget our millennia of experience, which includes the teaching of the one we once revered as our spiritual leader: seek first the Kingdom of God, and its righteousness, and all else will be added.

A verse that I like.

Quote:Jesus said to him, “I am the way, and the truth, and the life. No one comes to the Father except through me. John 14:6,ESV
 … whatever is true, whatever is honorable, whatever is just, whatever is pure, whatever is lovely, whatever is commendable, if there is any excellence, if there is anything worthy of praise, think about these things. Phil 4:8 (ESV)
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#19
(06-13-2016, 01:00 PM)radind Wrote:
(06-13-2016, 11:46 AM)Eric the Green Wrote:
(06-13-2016, 05:24 AM)pbrower2a Wrote:
(06-13-2016, 01:56 AM)taramarie Wrote:
(06-12-2016, 11:58 PM)pbrower2a Wrote: I am in great fear of losing everything. You do not understand the economics of the nursing home business in America.  

If we get good economic measures in return for gross inequity and a climate of fear, then something is wrong -- most likely with the economic elite. The MBA culture that formed around 1980 was a rejection of humanistic values that make life tolerable for non-elites. People who believe that no human suffering is in excess so long as the Right People get what they want (basically everything not necessary for animal-like survival for everyone else, as in fascist and feudal orders).

We make enough stuff. We do badly at creating happiness because the ideology of American elites well suited to the sweat-shop level of economic development.

You guys make enough "stuff" but people do not have the money to buy necessities and many are in debt. I believe that is what many are focusing on as the most important thing of all. Survival in hardship.


The economic elites have found how to control people so that they believe that nothing matters except that the elites get whatever they want -- which is everything. Around 1980 we largely Americans sold out to the concept that we are are nothing more than our basest drives. We allowed ourselves to be atomized in return for some vague promises of economic gain. Everything is about lucre.

We enter a Crisis Era because of the bad practices that have developed since the last Crisis, vices that have become nearly sacred. Yet those vices degrade us. Most arise from the 3T -- bad business practices and bad mass culture. One big contributor to our misfortune is the debasement of education, mostly from the Awakening-era "Multiversity". The idea that the college student wants to go as quickly into specialized training or to experience a watered-down grad school instead of developing some wisdom from millennia of experience best taught as the liberal arts has ensured that people, however technically proficient they may be, lack the wisdom even to recognize the virtue of reciprocal kindness. Life becomes little more than personal manipulation.

"Ship it", "sell it", "cut the deal". Of course it is all pragmatic. But what if "it" all depends upon the degradation of human existence?

That is all correct. We focus on economic gain, justified by and geared toward gain for the elite. We end up with neither real life, wisdom and culture OR economic gain. We forget our millennia of experience, which includes the teaching of the one we once revered as our spiritual leader: seek first the Kingdom of God, and its righteousness, and all else will be added.

A verse that I like.

Quote:Jesus said to him, “I am the way, and the truth, and the life. No one comes to the Father except through me. John 14:6,ESV

I'm not sure which verse you are saying you like.

But obviously, what Jesus was saying in John 14 is that the way is to know that you are God.

John 10:34: Jesus answered them, "Is it not written in your Law, 'I have said you are "gods"'?

Using the Bible or the Koran as an excuse for prejudice against gays or those of other religions, is not acceptable. Using sacred texts to claim that yours is the only true religion, is not acceptable. The results of accepting it: what we saw in Florida yesterday.
"I close my eyes, and I can see a better day" -- Justin Bieber

Keep the spirit alive;
Eric M
Reply
#20
(06-09-2016, 05:53 PM)pbrower2a Wrote:
(06-09-2016, 04:40 PM)X_4AD_84 Wrote: For some generations, adulthood is the Holy Grail. For such cohorts, it is a time of self sufficiency, rich rewards for hard work, and seemingly limitless opportunities. For others, it is an unending nightmare of shattered dreams, limits to growth, and a nasty ride down the razor blade of life culminating in death and decay. Identify your cohort and tell me your view.

I'm a late-wave Boomer, and I graduated from college (which was then relatively cheap), only to find that the Vietnam-era draft-dodgers had beaten me to all the desirable opportunities. What was left? The crap jobs of the 1970s -- fast food, retail sales, and work in sweat-shop factories. I could never get on track. Once one takes those crappy jobs one's career potential is gone. Some times I wish I had never been born. The only good thing to say about the last forty years is that we have had some really-cheap entertainment. Mass low culture has become the opiate of the masses in the sense that Karl Marx saw religion as the opiate of the masses.

At the least the oppressed prole toiling in a sweatshop had no obligation to express how happy he was to hold the job that he had. Today the prole often is obliged to suffer with a smile in jobs that show how degraded his life is. In that respect workers in the service jobs have it far worse, at least existentially, than the millhands of early capitalism. But that said, people addled on stupefying bilge might see nothing wrong.  

I could almost think of the plot of a dystopian novel in which a repressive and exploitative regime offers entertainment but little else as a reward for pliancy. If one is a double-high-ninety in verbal and mathematical aptitude, then that is the worst possible world. Most nasty systems co-opt people like me. Unfortunately that plot looks so much like reality that it would be a bore.

The rules changed for young workers around 1978. Before then college graduates could usually expect good pay in interesting work unless they went to some diploma mill. After that they were qualified to do the sorts of work that high-school graduates got. What has changed? A college education has become not only a way to qualify for jobs that used to require a high-school education, but also a means of beginning adulthood deeply in debt.
The last line reminds me of the line from the classic song "Sixteen Tons" - I owe my soul to the company store. Didn't think about this one, but most of us NOT carrying student loan debt nevertheless owe our souls to the credit card issues, mortgage holders and where we have car loans at. Meaning: the more things change; the more they stay the same.
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